[MD] Reductionism

[plattholden at gmail.com]

On 2 Jun 2009 at 7:41, John Carl wrote:

> Platt inflamed:
> 
> 
> > So capitalism has killed as many as communism and fascism? Is that
> > your claim? Let's see some proof. Otherwise, you're just popping off,
> > trying to defend the indefensible.
> 
> 
> 
> I sent a new thread that didn't go appear yet, perhaps exceeding some rule.
>  But  I was so glad to see Wired mag post an article on the subject dear to
> my heart, that I must dip my toe back in the water with you Platt.
> 
> http://www.wired.com/culture/culturereviews/magazine/17-06/nep_newsocialism
> 
> "The type of communism with which Gates hoped to tar the creators of Linux
> was born in an era of enforced borders, centralized communications, and
> top-heavy industrial processes. Those constraints gave rise to a type of
> collective ownership that replaced the brilliant chaos of a free market with
> scientific five-year plans devised by an all-powerful politburo. This
> political operating system failed, to put it mildly. However, unlike those
> older strains of red-flag socialism, the new socialism runs over a
> borderless Internet, through a tightly integrated global economy. It is
> designed to heighten individual autonomy and thwart centralization. It is
> decentralization extreme."

Platt calmly responds:

I read the article about voluntary collaboration at your suggestion and 
kept looking for something about the quality, merit or value of the end 
result. Nada. Just a lot of huggies about how marvelous it is that, with 
little at stake we can all get along. I learned that playing sandlot baseball 
at age 11.


> I'm not quite as burned out on the subject as your many detractors, but I
> must ask you if you are perhaps fighting the wrong battles?  Nobody wants to
> go back to communism the way it used to be; that's yesterday's news.


Oh? Have you been to North Korea lately? How about Cuba, Venezuela, 
or China? The way things are going, Communist China may well fulfill 
Kruchev's promise to the West,  "We will bury you."  You've heard about 
the ballooning U.S. debt the Chinese hold? The battles are far from 
over.

> What
> we need in this crisis time (and it must have made you cranky yesterday with
> all news outlets braying and the crashing of western capitalism falling down
> around our ears)  is clear thinking about where to go from here and how.
> 
> Or maybe we should just quit.

A crisis overblown to provide an excuse for the growth of big 
government with resultant loss of individual liberty.  But "just quit" is 
right. Quit coming up with big government programs full of social 
planning that crush individual liberty. From the clear-thinking Mr. Pirsig:

"It's about time to return to the rebuilding of this American resource -- 
individual worth." (ZMM) 

A lot more clear thinking about where to go from here and how is in 
Pirsig's later book, "Lila."

Platt